Gingerbread Boys to Gingerbread Men: The (Un)Stoppable Rise of FK Pardubice

Last week, I received one of the more romantic email propositions I’d received from anyone, let alone a Czech football club.

Picture the scene: your relationship is going down the pan, and you need to salvage something from it. What could be better than a stadium tour of the famous CFIG Arena of 4,200 seats? Though recently renovated, Pardubice’s current ground does have history dating back to the 1930s, even if the club itself has limited history of only 16 years. The arena has hosted all manner of sports, from speedway to athletics, as well as of course football.

They moved back into the CFIG Arena at the start of last year, and enjoyed a surprise 2-0 victory over Slavia Praha. There probably aren’t too many better ways to return home, having spent many years in the wilderness, ground sharing with Bohemians since promotion to the First League in 2020. Not only was this another stadium, but it was some hour and a half away in the Czech capital. 

They were only formed in 2008 as a ‘new football project’ for the city of Pardubice, who’ve long been (and still are) a hockeytown. They began life at Areál Pod Vinicí, which inevitably didn’t meet the criteria of the First League following a relatively speedy rise through the Czech League system. 

Essentially, all the clubs in Pardubice merged together - namely Tesla Pardubice, MFK Pardubice and Junior Pardubice. With none of these clubs having made the top flight before, that was the ultimate goal of the project - to give one of the Czech Republic’s major cities a top flight football club, like Prague, Ostrava, and (sometimes) Brno.

Beginning life in the fourth tier (Divizie C), they wouldn’t be there for long, as 2010 saw promotion to the ČFL - Czech Republic’s regionalised third tier. Again, it would only take another two years for them to gain promotion to the FNL, where they’d stay for another eight seasons, before an historic 2020 promotion to the top flight. 

Now under the guidance of former West Ham defender and midfielder Radoslav Kováč, they seem to be holding their own this season. Last season was a forgettable one, bar the final stretch of post-split fixtures, which saw crucial wins at Banik and Zbrojovka, as well as at home to Jablonec - all of which saw Pardubice qualify for the play-off against Příbram. They emerged 2-0 aggregate victors, again demonstrating the sheer gap between the two divisions in which no side from the second tier has won the promotion play-off since its introduction in 2018.

Prior to their fixture at home to Teplice, things had been going swimmingly since the return from the winter break, with two wins to write home about on the road - a 2-1 late win at Slovácko, and a 3-0 at struggling Karviná. This was a chance to stretch the gap between themselves and those languishing below them in the relegation group, though this was also the case for Teplice, who’d won their only game since the return - a vital 2-1 win at home to perennial strugglers Zlín.

Pardubice v Teplice

What’s the best thing you’ve done in 22 seconds? For Tomáš Zlatohlávek, it could well have been the opening goal of this game, which came at that particular timestamp - Teplice’s failure to switch on allowed Pardubice to nip in and seemingly continue their excellent vein of form. It wasn’t even the earliest goal of the day in the footballing world, with RB Salzburg scoring after five seconds at Blau-Weiss Linz in Austria!

Scoring so early on brings inevitable issues, however, as proved to be the case here. Pardubice had scarce chances to extend their lead, and seemed happy to sit back against a Teplice side intent on turning the screw more as the match went on. Eventually the pressure told, as Štěpán Chaloupek levelled with four minutes remaining. It was no more than they deserved, and on the balance of play, they really should have won.

It was an intriguing affair, though very little happened beyond the two goals. Both teams will be unhappy all told, given that Pardubice had held firm for so long, and that Teplice really were dominant toward the end of the game.

The Pardubice mascot - a sentient gingerbread man - also fired a t-shirt gun into the crowd at half-time, which was certainly something that happened. I also got reprimanded by one of the ultras for wearing a yellow and blue Stevenage shirt, forgetting that it was the colour of Pardubice’s opponents - oopsie!

I guess the question for Pardubice is now with regard to how far they can go - can they stay the course in the top flight for another three seasons? Could they go beyond that? Europe will definitely escape them this season, but in Czech football, anything is possible.